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Cipriani Yas Island just upped the dinner game significantly

The Italian restaurant has just taken the fine dining experience to another level with the help of a seaplane and private yacht.

While the UAE might get criticised for its lack of low budget hotels, it offers hugely varying options of eating out.

You can wander down to the nearest half decent café in your vicinity and pick the best thing off the menu. There’s going to a casual outlet where you can just about getaway with wearing a t-shirt and no jacket. And of course there’s the high-end, fine dining option reserved for Friday nights – or every night, if you’re our way inclined.

But there is now a new category that sits above fine dining… way above. And all you really need to decide is if you want to sail, or fly?

Yas Island’s Cipriani restaurant has begun offering two extremely high-end dinner packages that will make your go-to special occasion routine feel distinctly average. Effectively the same but equally different in their experiences, the two options mean you either fly to and over Yas Island before dinner, or sail around it.

Let’s start with the flying option (because the way we see it, if you do this one first, you could actually do both.)

Starting one hour before sunset, every day throughout the year there will be a Seawings plane waiting to leave Dubai Creek and fly to Yas Marina. The flight itself will of course offer astonishing views of Dubai’s skyline as dusk settles, before Abu Dhabi’s own metropolis comes into view, and you land on the water near the restaurant.

You then get to enjoy your three-course meal – up to Cipriani’s usual high standards – before taking the return transport, although that’s more likely to be an Uber than another flight.

So what does it cost for this super high-end dinner experience? AED 1,900 per person, for a minimum booking of 8 people. So you either need to find seven friends each willing to pay that price, or go all out to impress that special someone and cover all eight places – that’ll set you back AED 15,200. Although we reckon you could get them to knock off the 200.

If you’re already in Abu Dhabi and don’t fancy driving all the way to Dubai Creek just to fly back home, Cipriani also offers an alternative Snapshot experience. Taking off from Yas Marina, the plane will give you an aerial tour of Abu Dhabi before landing in time for your appetisers. That costs AED 1,295 per person – no minimum booking on this one, but it’s recommended for couples.

If flying isn’t your thing but you still fancy working up an appetite before dinner, the sail and dine option should suit any sophisticated gent.

You’ve got to get yourself to Yas Island first (this is where you could potentially combine both experiences and fly down) where Azure Marine, a classic mahogany yacht, will take you for a two-hour sunset cruise with drinks and canapés, before bringing you back to shore for the three-course dinner.

The sailing option only operates from Sunday to Wednesday, departing 5pm-7pm, and costs AED 7,500 for a group of 10 people. That’s AED 750 per head for you and nine friends, or the full whack for your own exclusive use.

So there you have it. Just when you thought the fine dining experience in the UAE couldn’t get any finer, Cipriani Yas Island goes and does this. See you on the plane?

Subscribe to the magazine

The Gulf region's leading men's luxury lifestyle magazine. For men who understand that the true value of luxury is its foundation in knowledge. Not so much a website, but an indispensable guide to life.